1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to the field of database query operations in a visual interface and more particularly to the visual construction and use of a database query operation in a visual interface.
2. Description of the Related Art
Database driven computing applications have formed the foundation of practical, enterprise computing for decades. Database driven computing applications relate to the free access by application logic of data stored and managed by a database management system. In this regard, in a database driven computing application, the application developer needn't worry about the fundamentals of data management, while the database architect needn't worry about the fundaments of application logic. Rather, each can focus on their respective responsibilities. Consequently, the marriage of data storage and management, and application logic has resulted in a voluminous collection of database driven computing applications providing advancements in industrial productivity far beyond that known prior to the age of personal computing.
Collaborative applications have capitalized on the effective nature of database driven computing. In a collaborative application, a group of collaborating end users can convene in a collaborative space defined by a computing application in order to share access to collaborative documents and communications. Exemplary collaborative documents include documents revealed through application sharing and documents revealed through shared libraries. Likewise, exemplary collaborative messages include chat threads and electronic mail. A well-known and extraordinarily popular collaborative application includes the Lotus™ Workplace™ database driven computing application manufactured by International Business Machines (IBM) Corporation of Armonk, N.Y., United States. (Lotus and Workplace are registered trademarks of IBM Corporation).
Due to the centralized focus of collaborative applications upon collaborative data, database access remains an integral part of collaborative computing. Generally, developing a collaborative workspace in a collaborative application requires the design of a visual user interface including the specification of one or more user interface controls in the visual user interface. The user interface controls often include a view to a result set from a database query, through the specification of one or fields for records in the result set. The database query, itself, often can be specified separately by the database developer.
To facilitate the independent development of customized collaborative applications by end users, advanced collaborative computing environments like Lotus Workplace permit end users to specify a desired database query through the design module for designing the visual interface. In Lotus Workplace, for instance, the design module is known as the Lotus Workplace Designer™. As the end user establishes a user interface control intended to reveal portions of a database query result set, the end user can visually specify the database query utilizing wizard-like technology as it is understood in the art. Consequently, the end user need not have a command of database programming languages such as the structured query language (SQL) in order to effectively develop a collaborative application.
While the visual development of a collaborative space incorporating one or more database queries can provide an ease of use experience for even the least sophisticated end user, the ease of use experience comes at a price. Specifically, to provide for the visual specification of a database query in a visual view for a collaborative space requires the embedding of the database query in the definition for the visual view. As a result, the embedded database query defined for each control in the visual view cannot be reused in different visual views. Accordingly, although the visual specification of the database query provides the advantage of ease of use, the visual specification of the database query lacks extensibility.